Memorial Day
by morgana07
Summary: 1-shot. Sam remembers the fallen on this Memorial Day in a way only a Winchester can but is still raw when it comes to remembering one fallen soul. *Upset/drunk/limp!Sam & a cameo by Dean.* Set at 09x23 Do You Believe in Miracles. Spoilers!


**Memorial Day**

**Summary: **_1-shot. Sam remembers the fallen on this Memorial Day in a way only a Winchester can but is still raw when it comes to remembering one fallen soul. *Upset/drunk/limp!Sam* Set at 09x23 Do You Believe in Miracles. Spoilers!_

**Warnings: **_Minor language and more than likely some tissues by the end._

**Tags/Spoilers: **_Yes, there are spoilers as this is set after the end of the finale, 09x23 Do You Believe in Miracles._

**Disclaimer: **_I don't own anything._

**Author Note: **_Originally this was planned for Memorial Day and is still aimed in that direction. The muse just decided to toss in some heartbreak toward the end so remember the above mentioned tissue warning. Also, to get this up in time (barely) it's going up without being beta'd._

**SPN SPN SPN SPN SPN**

Being raised by a former Marine for a father taught Sam Winchester a few things that he still remembered even now in his life. Some of it he wished he'd never been taught but the lesson on Memorial Day wasn't one of those.

"'_It's about more than three-days off, barbecues, hot dogs or picnics,_'" John Winchester had told his sons one year when they'd stopped in a small town to get gas and the usually gruff impatient man had taken the time to stop at a local cemetery to pay his respects to the fallen soldiers there. "'_It's about the men and women who served this country, defended it and died in its service. That's what this day is about and I never want either of you boys to forget that. I was one of the lucky ones who came out of Vietnam while others didn't and more are still missing_. _So always try to pay respect to those who have fallen._'"

The lesson was one of John's better ones and one of the few that Sam didn't resent. He and his older brother had always tried to keep up with it. They'd started with just following their Dad's example and if they were on the road during a hunt they'd find a local cemetery to pay respect to the fallen soldiers then as they began to lose more and more of their own; friends, allies, family, they began to also honor those fallen heroes as well.

Today Sam had walked the distance from the Men of Letters bunker; he still wasn't ready to reach for the set of keys with a bullet for a keychain. He was still too raw for that yet so he'd walked to town to pick up a few groceries, he didn't need much now as he was alone and he never could cook like…like his brother could it seemed.

He'd known what day it was and had dug out a small metal box from the trunk of the Impala. It was sitting on the table in the library back at the bunker along with several glasses and a bottle of Jack Daniels that had been his brother's favorite.

Before walking back he paused to detour through the cemetery they'd found shortly after making the bunker their home. He'd noticed on a trip here when he'd been stressed out recently that a lot of the flags were looking worn out so this trip into town in addition to a few groceries Sam had also purchased as many small flags as the store had to replace the worst of them.

"Thank you," he whispered to the silent stones and then made the trip back to the bunker. Locking the door behind him with a dim thought that sooner or later he really should redo the wards they'd broken to allow certain things inside but given the drawback to that Sam put it off for later.

He was also putting off answering his cellphone. It wasn't that he was being rude. He just wasn't ready to actually make the admission to anyone yet and especially not to either Sheriff Mills or Mrs. Tran, both of whom had been calling him for several days.

Sam winced at the hollow echoing sound that the place seemed to make these days and knew if he didn't need access to the library and things stored inside the bunker that he'd probably be back on the road or living in the Impala…except he was afraid that would give him more pain since even sitting behind the wheel of that car was like a jagged knife in…okay, Sam stopped that thought before it could go too much farther.

He placed the groceries where they belonged and gave the still spotless kitchen a glance to make sure everything was where it should be, where…Dean had kept it and Sam sighed at the burning tears that filled his eyes when he made himself think his brother's name.

It had been only eight days since it happened. Since Sam's already topsy-turvy world had gotten completely turned upside down in a way that he was still hoping he could fix before he was forced to do something that even he wasn't sure could be done.

Leaving the kitchen, Sam made a quick trip to his room to take something from a small inside hidden pocket in his duffel and then went to the library to take a slow seat.

The metal box and the whiskey were where he'd left them as were the glasses he'd carefully counted out that morning to be sure he didn't forget anyone. Looking at the glasses now Sam gave a soft sarcastic chuckle and knew the odds were good since he wasn't a whiskey drinker that he'd be drunk off his ass before he made the final salute.

This side of the tradition had started after they'd lost Jo and Ellen and since then it both stunned and saddened the younger Winchester how many more glasses and items they'd added to the box.

Opening the bottle Sam poured the first shot while reaching into the box to remove a small faded photo of Mary Winchester, one of the few that he knew existed still. He offered a small sad smile to the mother he couldn't recall as more than a distant memory.

A photo of a pretty blond young woman in a nurse costume gave some bittersweet feelings as he drank to his girlfriend. Jessica Moore had been the first to die in Sam's new battle against the evil in his life and it was times like this that he wished he'd never met her so she might have lived.

He drank a shot to Pastor Jim who'd been a longtime friend and ally of the Winchesters and a man who'd done his best to help soften the hard lives he and Dean led as children. Sam's fingers touched the small crucifix the man had given him on his 10th birthday while swallowing the shot with a hiss.

Caleb had been a fellow hunter around Dean's age. Sam's memories of him were listening to his Dad bitch that every time Caleb and Dean hunted together they ended up in trouble. He was good with weapons and had the ability to get between brother and father when they disagreed over something. He, like Pastor Jim, had died at Meg's hands in a way to get to Sam's father.

As he poured the next glass Sam's hand shook. It was hard still to remember his Dad without some amount of bitterness. A lot of it had gone away over the years as more truths had come to light about their lives but there were still things that Sam held against the man but as he looked at the photo of the three of them together he smiled and swallowed the shot down. "I'm sorry I let you down, Dad," he whispered, and hated how his own voice came back at him.

Reaching into the box, Sam removed a picture of the first and best Roadhouse that Ellen Harvelle had owned. This picture wasn't meant to remind him of the hardheaded motherly woman or her daughter but of the elite computer expert who'd lived there and who'd helped them more than once. Ash had died when the place was destroyed by demons looking to keep information about Yellow Eyes and his 'special kids' a secret.

The buzzing of his phone made Sam look up but he chose to ignore it for the moment. He had plenty of time to drive to Sioux Falls to tell Jody the news and he knew Mrs. Tran had more important things to worry about, especially now that Heaven was open and Kevin's spirit could cross.

Sam now thought of Ellen and Jo and felt his throat close because no matter what Dean or Bobby had told him their deaths were on his head because they'd offered to help them use the Colt on Lucifer without knowing it wouldn't work.

To this day Sam could still see Jo fall as that goddamn hellhound tore into her when she tried to defend his brother. He could also see the pain in Dean's face as he said goodbye to a girl that he often wondered if his brother did consider more than a surrogate sister.

Ellen had stayed behind with Jo and had blown up the building to take the hounds out while giving them a chance to escape. For Sam, they were two more deaths that he'd always have blood on his hands for and for that he poured two double shots, not even noticing how the liquor didn't burn as much anymore.

A half full bottle of alcohol was what Sam took out in memory of Rufus Turner. The grizzled hunter who had reminded Sam of the Odd Couple when he and Bobby got together had paid the ultimate price a monster from the pits of Purgatory possessed Bobby and he'd stabbed him. Rufus had been gruff and stern but had never questioned their place in Bobby's life or Bobby's in theirs.

An old key to a house that no longer existed thanks to Dick Roman's Leviathans was picked up next. He and Dean had bickered about what to keep but after it was clear that burning Bobby Singer's body after he'd been shot covering for another escape didn't send the man across when they finally burned his flask they also burned his last trucker's cap…the one with the bullet hole in it so the key to the house in the junkyard was all that remained.

Bobby, like Pastor Jim, had been there for them growing up. He'd been mentor, friend, and surrogate father in times when their own hadn't been around and for years before his death. Sam's head had been screwed up by visions of Lucifer but he still remembered the loss and he still asked himself if the junkyard owner turned hunter had truly forgiven him for trying to kill him while he'd been soulless.

A bullet with a devil's trap carved into it reminded Sam of Henry Winchester, their grandfather, who'd come through a closet door seeking help to destroy a Knight of Hell and found them. It had been the blunt Man of Letters who'd revealed what their heritage should have been and had ultimately given his life to help Dean save Sam's life and had helped them learn about the Men of Letters, a secret society that had long ago stopped existing.

Sam was putting off the most painful until last so he went through the others that his blurring mind could think of that had been allies or even distant tense allies who'd perished…like Benny.

The vampire had been Dean's friend. They met and survived Purgatory together and Sam didn't deny his hate and mistrust of the man from the first moment of meeting him but it had been Benny, on Dean's behalf, that had sacrificed his new life to return to Purgatory to help Sam escape with Bobby's soul. He'd chosen to remain there to give Sam the time to escape and because he knew he was losing his fight to drink blood. Sam wished he'd have had the chance to thank him for helping him get back to his brother and often wondered if he was still alive and trapped in Hell's backyard.

Sarah Blake was remembered with a hotel card of the place they'd bunked at the first time they'd met the young woman; a young woman who'd been targeted by Crowley in addition to a young man they'd saved from a Wendigo just because they happened to know the Winchesters.

She'd been one of the first women that had attracted Sam after Jessica and one that had always held a special spot in his heart even though they never saw one another again until the night of her death.

A phone was touched and this item made Sam's stomach turn because for as long as he lived he would never forget watching Kevin Tran, former student of Advance Placement and turned reluctant Prophet of the Lord, die at his hands while Gadreel controlled his body.

The guilt would always be there for Kevin no matter what anyone said to him because even though it had been his brother's choice to let the angel in to save Sam's life it had still been Sam's body that was used to kill a kid that had never wanted this life and who had just asked them to stop fighting the last time they'd seen his spirit.

Sam guessed they had patched things up before it…happened but he couldn't help the edge of anger at himself for being so stubborn, so much like a damn Winchester, that he hadn't done it sooner. If he had he might've stopped Dean or been there to talk him out of accepting that goddamn Mark of Cain.

Swallowing the shot, Sam carefully packed every item back into the box while reaching for something else and the bottle of whiskey. The next shot he'd take would be the rest of the bottle and not up here but in the most rightful place to remember the one person who would always be a hero in Sam's mind.

The walk to the garage was an unsteady one and as he made his way there the still grieving and more than a little drunk hunter thought to those lost but not dead.

Garth was a werewolf and Sam tried to make a mental note to call and check up on him and his wife. Charlie was living an adventure in Oz with Dorothy and that was still mind blowing to Sam to learn that Oz really existed. Krissy and her friends were also out there in addition to others who hunted, who'd known them good or bad and Sam drank a pull in memory of them and for those who'd go long after he was even gone.

Flipping the light to the garage on, Sam caught his breath and tried to keep the burning tears down for a moment at the sight of the shiny black 1967 Chevy Impala that had been both home and wheels since he'd been six months old and the fire changed their family.

The car had been given to Dean by their father and would always be Dean's as far as Sam was concerned. His hand ran down the side before he slowly opened the passenger side door; nope, he was not ready to sit behind the wheel yet.

He did put the key in just so he could play one of the ancient cassette tapes his brother loved while placing an old photo of the two of them together when Sam had been a baby before the fire and then a more recent one on the dash along with a black rubber bracelet, the silver ring his brother once wore and finally the item that Sam had retrieved from his duffel.

This tribute both made him sick and left him hollow because while all the others were for people who were deceased in Sam's mind he was still having trouble accepting that Dean was…dead. He'd spent two full days practically curled in on himself after learning the truth and still didn't know what to think about it.

His brother had been Sam's world ever since he'd first opened his eyes. After the fire, after their father had become obsessed with hunting down the supernatural it had practically been Dean who'd taken care of him. It had been Dean who Sam accepted raised and cared for him and who he respected when the fights between him and John began to escalate.

Sure, they'd fought plenty over the years and both had said some crap that had never been fully resolved but in the end they were brothers and Sam knew he would've done anything to save his brother from Hell, from Purgatory and he will do anything it takes to bring Dean back from this.

He'd been willing to make a deal or force Crowley to fix the mess he got his brother into when he learned with a sickeningly hurtful blow to his heart that this would be more difficult to fix because how the hell could be change what the Mark had turned his brother into.

Dean had said it was turning him into something he didn't want to be and now Sam had to wonder if this was something even worse than what Dean had meant.

Aside from the guilt at himself for not being there when Dean had tried to defeat Metatron, Sam also blamed Castiel and Crowley for their own parts. The demon had led Dean down the path to get the Mark and Castiel had said Dean was their only shot at taking down the super-powered egotistical former scribe of God but yet when Dean had been stabbed and bleeding out no angel had been around to save him; to stop his brother from dying and letting the Mark bring him back into whatever the hell he'd become.

The logical side of Sam knew it wasn't all Castiel's fault since he'd been trying to distract Metatron by destroying the Angel tablet but right that moment and for the last eight days Sam wasn't feeling all that logical.

No, he was feeling more like the same broken, scared young man he'd been when he'd watched his brother be torn to shreds by a Hellhound; only this time as he sat in the car to star at these items and drank the rest of the whiskey Sam's grief was mingled with determination that he would not fail to save Dean again.

If it cost him his life he would find a way to get that Mark off his brother and then he'd force Castiel or Heaven to heal his brother. They'd been pawns to both nearly all their lives it seemed and this time had made Sam sick of it.

If Heaven refused to help him then he'd go the other way. Sam would find a way to have a heart to heart with the asshole who'd created the Mark in the first place and to say he still had issues with Lucifer was an understatement.

He wouldn't be anyone's vessel but if letting Crowley think he'd open the Cage to free both Michael and Lucifer got him closer to finding a way to get his brother back from becoming the King of Hell's new Knight then that's what he do.

Sam let the empty bottle drop from his fingers while slipping the cord of the little bronze amulet back around his neck to feel it lay as it had after he'd worn it while Dean was trapped in Hell only this time he swore it was warmer.

He'd given Dean the amulet when his brother had been 12 and he'd worn it all the time except for those four months or 40 years depending on your time frame of Hell. Sam recalled the day that bitterness, lies and pain in the ass Angels had led him to lose faith in their bond as brothers and Dean had dropped the amulet in a trash can.

It had broken Sam's heart as much as walking into Dean's room the other night and seeing those black eyes before they shifted back to green had. Now he was alone and missing the brother who had always been a phone call away even when he'd been in college and could've gotten past his own stubbornness and called.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, Sam's eyes had blurred from too much booze and too many tears while he slipped the photos into his wallet, the silver ring into his pocket the bracelets onto his wrist. None of this would go into the metal box until he was damn certain he'd lost his brother once and for all and then he'd be giving the box to Dean to put something of his in it.

Drunk and sick with building grief, Sam wondered how his phone had gotten into the car with him since he thought he'd left it upstairs but finally reached for it with shaking fingers. "… 'lo," he thought he got the greeting out.

"You drunk?"

Sam had been expecting to hear Jody's voice or Mrs. Tran's. He had not been expecting to hear the low deep voice of a man who should be dead to him. He was just on the side of not being drunk enough to handle hearing from his brother to let out a soft choked sob before nodding before he remembered Dean couldn't see him.

"Think so," Sam slurred, having to squint his eyes to change cassette tapes. "M…Memorial Day memories."

He thought he might have heard a low 'huh' but waved it off as his drunk mind playing tricks because this Dean wouldn't give a damn about that tradition.

"Where you at, Sam?" the voice still sounded like Dean despite an extra layer of gruff gravel to it. It didn't help to ease the ache in Sam's heart.

"Where…you at, Dean?" he countered when he suddenly decided he needed to be in the back seat and nearly fell twice getting his long legs under him before grunting as he fell into the rear seat to let his eyes land on the little green Army soldier still stuffed in the ashtray of the door.

"God, you sound plowed," Dean muttered. "How long have you been drinking?"

"Wasn't…the time but the…amount," Sam pulled his legs into the back to try to focus his eyes on where their initials had been carved as kids. "Full bottle, a shot for…for everyone…we've lost and…and the rest for you even though…I'm…I'm gonna get…get you back, De'n. Not gonna fail you again."

"You never failed me, Sam. I didn't want you in that fight and if you had been there…it still would've happened cause the Mark was changing me. I would've died from it and I still would've come back like this," Dean sounded resigned but that just fueled Sam's determination to make it right. "You in the Impala?"

Sam's finger touched the carving but his eyes went to the Army man so that was what he reached for. "Yep, won't drive her but wanted to…do this…here. We grew up here, De."

The longer it went the more letters Sam dropped and despite all the changes in him now nothing could ever stop Dean Winchester from feeling his baby brother's grief. "Yeah, we did, Sammy," he agreed, ignoring the curious look he was being given from the King of Hell while his middle finger shot up in the air as a gesture to stop the sarcasm about to come his way. "Now do you remember what I told you the night my deal came due?"

"…'member what you taught me, take care of your wheels and…" Sam laid his head on the back seat, fingers still grasping the soldier that had once broken Lucifer's hold on him. "I…I can't let go yet. You taught me to fight for my family and I might've…lost the rest of it…but I'll go straight to the Cage and give myself to Lucifer before I stop trying to save you."

"Sam!" Dean's voice dropped to a tone a lot closer to their Dad's and he was surprised to still feel terror at what had just been suggested. "You stay away from the Cage and Lucifer! Just…use that bring brain of yours before you do anything stupid and…go sleep this off upstairs, Sam."

"Hate this place without you," Sam mumbled, pulling his legs into the backseat to try to curl up to maybe sleep without waking up to watching his brother bleeding out in his arms. "So empty now."

"So call Jody and get her to come down and visit or something," Dean was fighting his basic need that was still humming inside to protect to the danger he could be to Sam. "Or go visit her or…"

"I want _you_ to come home!" Sam yelled, rage and grief running together as his voice broke into brutal sobs that he'd been hiding for days. "I want…I want my brother back! I want…I want to go back so many years and stop it all. I…I wanna…d…"

"Stop," Dean commanded in the same tone of voice he always did when needing to bring Sam back around. The commanding tone had never worked for their father but it had worked for him, usually. "No, you don't. One of us going down is bad enough but you're not letting either side claim you, not like this and not because of me. No stunts or I will show up to kick your ass."

Sam snorted, sobs slowly easing off as his eyes got heavier and he felt his exhausted and drunk mind slowly drifting off to the sounds of his brother's voice in his ear. "Miss you," he mumbled and never heard the response.

Sam was sound asleep and missed the Impala turning off, the tape being removed and the phone disconnecting. He also missed the feel of an old worn blanket from Sam's room being draped over him before strong fingers carded through his hair a final time.

"Miss you too, little brother. Remember the good, Sammy because that's what I'll do no matter how this goes."

Dean Winchester had learned that strong emotions made him lose control of the eye change so he had to work at controlling it as he made sure his brother would sleep and made the empty bottle of whiskey vanish a second before he did as well with the hopes that come next Memorial Day his brother didn't have more people to mourn.

**The End**


End file.
